My Name

I was always not Muralee Thummarukudy, it took many years before I got this name. This is the story of that evolution.

In younger days it was easy, my name was Muraleedharan. Muraly meant a flute and dharan meant ‘the one who is holding’ , so Muraleedharan meant in my language ‘one holding a flute’. Lord Krishna, one of our 330 million gods, was famous for holding a flute, and thus I shared my name with him. Everybody in my village knew my name and called me Muraly.

But as I grew up and went out of my own place, suddenly identity became an issue. It started in 1986, when I applied for a passport.

“What is your name?”

“Muraleedharan.”

“What is your surname, Muralee or Dharan?”

“Well, I don’t have a surname?”

“Ok then, give your full name.”

“Muraleedharan T.R.”

“What does T.R. stand for?”

“Thummarukudyil Raman Nair.”

“Ok then, is Raman Nair your surname?”

“No, that is my father’s name.”

“Ok then, Thummarukudyil is your surname.” So I understood that Thummarukudyil is indeed my surname, whatever it meant.

When I started filling forms to send abroad, the identity crisis revisited me.

As far as form-filling is concerned, I am inspired by the gentleman who, after being fed up by the postal system asking him to declare what he was mailing, kept on writing “Undergarments for an elephant” for 32 years, before a parcel agent picked it up. So I never changed my name to suit the form.

When I filled forms, I invariably filled Muraleedharan Thummarukudy Raman Nair and then soon I got letters addressing me either as “Thummarukudy” or as “Raman Nair”, both names I could not identify myself with.

When I came to Geneva, my IT focal point gave me this e-mail address of muralee.thuMarukudy@unep.ch. My name on the other hand had two “m”s in ThuMMarukudy. People started making so many mistakes that I asked my IT expert to give me om@unep.ch.

To point out simply, (or simbly, as we pronounce the word), call me “Muralee”.

My Family

I grew up in one of the undeveloped villages of India filled with traditions and superstitions. I belong to a community known as nairs, which is something of a singular type as far as social anthropology goes. Nairs had a social system whereby property passed through the women in the family. So after marriage, men went to live with the women in their household. However, tradition also dictated that the property of the household be looked after by the brother of the women than the husband. Therefore, my family consisted of my uncle, who was the head of the family, my mother, my siblings (4 sisters and three brothers), and my father. My uncle looked after our training in traditions. My father was just one among us, more of a friend.

While my family believed in value of education, my uncle did take the precaution of trying to train me as a farmhand. In fact, all my elder brothers used to get up 4:00 A.M. in the morning, get the bullocks out, take them to the field and plough the land till 8:30 A.M., and after the work, they went to school or college. By the time I was of that age (13), the green revolution in India had taken roots, and with the help of high-yielding variety crops, we had surplus rice to sell and my family could afford an extra worker. I could therefore focus on my studies a little more than my brothers and sisters, which I did.

My Earliest Memory

I remember the day when I told my mother that I will sleep alone because her tummy was getting very big. She was pregnant with my younger brother and I must have been three. I have strong recollections of all events afterwards.

My Childhood

I did not have a luxurious childhood; but certainly I had a secure one. I had numerous jobs to do, like carrying harvested paddy to the house, watering hundreds of coconut and banana trees in the summer, taking milk to neighboring households or the shop, buying stuff from the shop, collecting cashew nuts, frightening off pigeons during sowing season, and parrots during harvesting season, and so on.

Lot of children who grow up in cities have this romantic idea of farming. They all want a farm house and retire into farming life. They have no clue about the day-to-day life in a farmer’s house. Life is tough. You are at the mercy of the elements of nature. No sooner you have planted paddy, rain comes down and washes it all. You spend 5 years nurturing a calf before it is big enough to have babies and give milk. No sooner you start selling your milk, a snake bites the cow and it is dead, and so on.

While I hated the hard work in the farm, I was always close to nature. I think it is there in my blood. My mother knows the name of every weed, bush, plant, creeper, and tree in our compound, (which, you should understand, is many hectares in area, and ranges from an undisturbed piece of forest to plantation, to paddy fields to coconut groves to whatever you can name in the tropics). Associated with the land are the animals, which range from foxes (an occasional nocturnal visitor) to cobras to squirrels to whatever. Not only she knew them by their species name (not Latin species), she knew at least one use for them. She had strict guidelines on which trees we could cut and which we could not, in which area of the compound snakes can be killed and which area they shouldn’t be, and so on. In retrospect, she is the epitome of ethnic knowledge to me.

Me and Nature

While my mother was seeped in ethnic wisdom of the biosphere, we were all integrated into nature by default. In my childhood, we did not have a study room and there was no electricity in the house to study. So the only option was to go out to the fields and read as long as the sun was up. We used to climb up the tree, lie down on convenient branches, and read on and on. My mother would bring drinks (water boiled with ginger) and eatables (tapioca with sardines) to this tree. There were days when I would fall asleep on the top of this 10-meter top tree branch and my mother would be totally confused as to whether to call out (which might cause me to suddenly wake up and fall down in the process) or leave me there (which allows the possibility of fall anyway).

We had no bathroom (though we had toilets) and bathing was always in the open. In the rainy seasons, we went to the family pond and in the summer we bathed next to our well. I had to cross a small stream to go to school and it was important that you learnt swimming before you could go to school. My sisters taught me how to swim by the time I was four and I started schooling when I was five.

Summer was the period of fruits in our place. We had loads of mangoes and different versions of jackfruits. Everyday, we would be on the top of a tree picking fruits. Every afternoon was spent under a mango tree sitting and playing. This was were friendships were formed and destroyed.

Monsoon was the time for fishing. We used all crude methods for fishing, such as poisoning with natural saps, chemicals, hitting with blunt instruments, and, sometimes, mercifully with a hook and line. My best friend Muralee and I always had the dream of buying an air gun and shooting all the pelicans in the farm to eat them. But that remained a dream.

Early Lessons in Nationalism and Politics

My early guru in politics and nationalism was my cousin Keralan chettan, we called him SK. The earliest event I remember is that of Indo-Pak war of 1971. We would get up at 4 A.M. and walk 2 km to collect the newspaper to read the day’s stories. He would then explain to me all about Mukti Bahini, Mojibur Rahman, and the gnat planes.

In 1975, a state of emergency was declared in India and, on the whole, life improved. There were no strikes and things seemed to work better. However, it was once again SK who told me that emergency would destroy our democratic fabric. I did not understand much as I was only 11 years old then. However, since SK said it, it must be true!!

Early Education in Secularism

I did not become a secularist by accident. I learnt it by practice. My uncle had commercial links with people from all religions. Aali mappila used to bring fish, Kunji Kochu mappila used to broker for cattle, Oorayi mappila used to buy bananas, and Poker mappila had the bullock cart. On the other hand, we had Jacob mappila who was our partner in farming, Pappy mappila who was partner in business, and Bahanan Kunju who ammavan supported through childhood. All these people used to visit home often, were treated with respect, and were invited for important celebrations and events.

I studied in a Christian management school, we went to church often, especially when somebody died, or for the festivals. Our classmates were from all religious, we went to their houses, our teachers belonged to different religions and never ever did I feel discriminated on the basis of religion in my childhood.

Me and my Caste

As you know, in India, your caste is very important and much of family life builds around it. I am a nair, which is considered an upper class in Kerala. However, my uncle, who was a communist, ensured that we never felt anything “upper” about it. People of all castes had access to our house, and all were treated equally.

However, I lived my childhood in the social reality of the times when caste was important. So while my house was open to all, not everybody would enter the house. They kept their distance. Some people would enter the sitting room but not the kitchen. Some people would wash their plates after they had food at my house. However, I have never heard my mom complaining about anybody not sticking to any such unwritten rule. In my mind, therefore, there was only one type of people. Human!

Me and God

It was customary at home to chant our prayers in the evening. After taking bath at 7 P.M., we all clubbed around the ceremonial lamp and sung songs praising the Gods. Food was served only after an hour or so after the prayers, though, on those days, when there was fish cooked, we wanted to cheat and my mom often allowed us to cheat. My eldest sister was very good at singing but was also very strict. No cheating was possible when she was leading the prayers.

I started having doubts about God’s existence when I was in class two. Somehow I figured out that God is a creation of human beings and passing the buck to him is futile. I did express my doubts to my parents but this was not met with lot of encouragement or enlightenment. To their credit, they did not snub me either. Of course, I did not push this very far as temple festivals were the only occasions we would go out of the house as a family and I did not want to miss out on that.

However, I think from the age of 12 or so I had declared independence from God and have thankfully remained like that since. I do go to temples now but continue to believe that God is a creation of humans and not other way round.

The Landscape of my Life

The place where I grew up is one of the spots in the universe where changes have been least. Compared to any other place on earth that I know, this place is somewhat stuck in time due to a number of reasons. However, there are changes there too. Some of the big trees which were there are not there any more. The biggest mango tree, we called it neeran maavu, is gone. The tamarind tree disintegrated in one storm. The anjily trees (diptocarpus indicus), which nourished our childhood and honed our skills, was cut down probably to build houses somewhere. Much of our land is now covered with monoculture of teak.

The same is happening in the landscape of my life. Much of the characters who dominated my childhood are not there anymore. Achan died in 1997 and ammavan in 1999. Bhavani chittamma, ammayi from Manjummal, kochu vallyachan, vallya vallyachan, Aali mappila, Jacob mappila, Vishwa Nathan valliachan, Govinda Pillla kochachan, Sreedharan Pilla kochachan are all gone. My mind’s landscape is also getting barren. I new sprouts coming up by way of young generation and I try to to connect to them. But you always long for the shade provided by the tall trees.

My valliamma once used a very interesting phrase when talking about life. She said, “I am old and looking forward to my death. What is there for me now? Most of the people who I knew are up there (meaning heaven, dead and gone) than down here.”

Well, I am not yet there, but every time a tree falls in my minds landscape, I remember valliamma.